When soft tissue such as a ligament or a tendon becomes detached from a bone, surgery is usually required to reattach or reconstruct the tissue. Often, a tissue graft is attached to the bone to facilitate regrowth and permanent attachment. Techniques and devices that have been developed generally involve tying the soft tissue with suture to an anchor or a hole provided the bone tissue. Knotless suture anchors, such as the two piece Arthrex PushLock® anchor, disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,329,272, have been developed to facilitate tissue fixation to bone.
It would be desirable to provide a suture construct which has a design that allows tensioning of the construct as necessary and upon insertion into bone. Also needed is a suture construct that may be knotless and that is formed essentially of a soft material such as suture (or suture-based materials or other soft materials and/or compositions) with the ability to be inserted into a bone socket and then tightened by simple traction on one of the suture strands.